Wash Allen leaves KCOH, new program schedule begins Monday

KCOH (1430 AM) listeners said goodbye Thursday to veteran midday host Wash Allen and will part ways with another long-running show today as the station enters its final weeks at the 1430 AM frequency.

Allen, whose “Confessions” show had aired on KCOH since 1971, elected not to make the move with his colleagues to 1230 AM on March 1 and hosted his final show Thursday.

The “Gospel Melody Time” morning show will end after today as KCOH begins a new program schedule Monday, said midday host Michael Harris.

“Waking Up Houston,” hosted by James White and Akua Fayette, will air from 5 to 8 a.m., followed by Harris’ “Person to Person” show and a new show from noon to 2 p.m. hosted by Lisa Berry-Dockery and Paris Eley. The rest of the schedule, including longtime hosts Don Samuels and Ralph Cooper, will remain unchanged.

“We want to be a station that everybody feels they can listen to,” Harris said. “Our experiences may be different, but we can grow and learn from each other. Our goal is to be inclusive.”

KCOH’s longtime general manager and majority owner, Michael Petrizzo, died in January 2012. The station, which bills itself as the state’s oldest African-American-formatted radio station, was sold in November for $2.1 million the La Promsea Foundation of Midland.

La Promesa will convert the 5,000-watt frequency on March 1 to the Catholic-oriented Guadalupe Radio Network.

KCOH’s call letters and programming, meanwhile, will move to the 1,000-watt 1230 AM, owned by Lieberman Broadcasting, under a lease-purchase agreement with Jesse Dunn, whose Paraclete Church Ministries made an unsuccessful bid to buy KCOH in 2009 for $8.75 million.

“Through the turmoil we have gone forward, and the only one who is not going forward with us is Wash,” Harris said.

Allen said the frequency and ownership change prompted his decision to leave KCOH. He said he has received offers from three local stations and plans to return at an unspecified time with a local show he hopes will receive national distribution.

“People say ‘you can’t leave, you’ve been here too long,’ but I think it’s the perfect time,” he said. “This is exciting to me. I used to beg to be somewhere, but now I make the choice of where I’m going to be.”

Allen said he will continue with his other ventures, including a television show on KTRK (Channel 13) and a dance series called “Wash Allen’s Happy Feet.”

He said KCOH faces challenges at its new frequency.

“I think it can succeed,” he said. “There are great possibilities for anything to happen. But I just don’t know how it’s going to be, going from 1430 to 1230. I don’t know what kind of impact that’s going to have on people, on things. It could be great or it could not.”

Samuel said he will miss his colleague of 30 years.

“It hurts when you break a link in a chain, but the station will go on,” Samuel said. “One thing that is for certain is change.”

Harris said he was disappointed Allen will not remain on KCOH and believes changes such as dropping the morning gospel show are necessary.

“The old KCOH was paid for,” he said. “The new one has to pay for the (1230 AM) lease and raise enough money to close out the purchase and take care of this building (KCOH’s longtime studios on Almeda Road).”

He said the morning show will provide an alternative to conservative talk on other Houston stations and “give our audience more information from a diverse viewpoint.”